March 9, 2014

MORALITY IS ALWAYS ISOLATING:

Yesterday Greg Sargent drew attention to WaPo/ABC poll findings showing support for marriage equality continuing to increase, with Americans supporting it by a 59/34 margin, with half now viewing the right to marry as constitutionally protected. His main point was that Republicans were held back from accommodating this rapid and likely irreversible shift (have you ever heard of a former supporter of marriage equality?) in public opinion by the stolid opposition of white evangelicals, who aren't much shifting at all.

I think it's useful to underline the isolation of white evangelicals on all issues related to homosexuality, using the handy WaPo/ABC crosstabs.

Since the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church is pretty heavily invested in efforts to resist same-sex marriage and to create broad "religious liberty" protections for those who resist it in a way that might violate discrimination laws, let's look at how rank-and-file white Catholics compare to white evangelicals on these issues:

On same-sex marriage itself, white Catholics support it 70/26, while white evangelicals oppose it 28/66.

According to the poll, 27% say that abortion should be legal in all circumstances, 13% say it should be legal in most circumstances, 38% say that it should be legal in few circumstances, and 20% say abortion should always be illegal.